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[Blood-Pigggy]

<div align="center">Diablo II (Lord Of Destruction)

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Diablo 2 brings incredibly addictive gameplay, and some surprisingly deep character development together.


Somewhere in the RPG genre, there is a line. This line seperates the complex and story oriented RPGs from the action based gameplay oriented RPGs. While gaming snobs constantly attempt to discredit the latter, their attempts fall flat, as while the deep and complex RPGs usually deliver quite well, it never stacks up to the pure addictive qualities of the other side of the line, the action oriented RPG.

Diablo 2 picks up after the original Diablo. The warrior who defeated Diablo prior to this installment has found the bright idea of jamming the "soulstone" which holds the essence of the invading demon Diablo. His belief that he can contain this monster within himself is dashed as he finds that he will not be able to contain the demon for much longer. Now he travels east to find his demonic brothers, Mephisto, and Baal, so that he may continue his war to take over the human realm. You must battle through his minions, and find him in his lair in hell, and put an end to the demonic invasion.

It's a cookie cutter story, but the history surround the world and backstory is fascinating, and the dialouge cinematics are very well done, and the writing is exceptional.

While many people argue that Diablo 2 and its expansion aren't RPGs, and just "action games with experience points tacked on" they're sorely mistaken, as despite the clickfest nature that Diablo 2 carries, the game has a surprisingly deep, and quite complex and powerful leveling system.
Even though Diablo 2 has been out for six years, and the expansion around four, there are still new types of characters being developed each day on BattleNet (Blizzard's multiplayer component for most of their games) which shows Diablo 2's pure potential to express creativity in however you wish to develop your character.
As in any RPG Diablo 2 has an wealth of quests. Unlike the original Diablo, they aren't randomized anymore, but instead, Blizzard opted to go for far more interesting and rewarding quests than those of the original. Most quests push the storyline further, but there are a few optional quests which are worth doing purely for the great bonuses they offer.

Diablo 2 plays quite simply, which allows nearly anyone to jump right into the game without a problem. While developing your skills properly might take some time taking used to, navigating the world and laying waste to your enemies will be as simple as ever, putting aside the annoying dice rolls and mysterious random resistance rolls.
D2 instead opts to use a simple armor and attack rating system, which without throwing in anymore annoying and confusing numbers, simply dictates how hard it is for an enemy to hit you, or the chance you'll hit an enemy respectively.

Allowing you to focus more on the game itself, and less on random numbers and meaningless statistics, Diablo 2 plays by nearly only two buttons, the left mouse button, and the right mouse button. You can assign which ever skills you've chosed to either button, and you can hotkey each skill for easy access. You can switch your skills on the fly (operating as spells or combat skills, and passive skills that work on their own, adding benefits to your character constantly). While you battle, the game is mostly handled by clicking on your enemies with either button to deliver your attack of choice.

Battles become far more interesting as resistences and weakness come into play, so that the game doesn't degenrate into a completely mindless waste. Certain monsters are weak to fire or ice, or etc. proper detection of such weakness will make the game easier for most players, and proves to spice up the gaming experience quite a bit.
Diablo 2 handles leveling up quite easily. A bar at the bottom of the interface shows your progress to the next level as you kill enemies. Once you do level, you get the chance to distribute five stat points and one single skill point.

While this review contains both Diablo 2 and it's expansion Lord of Destruction, one should note the differences. Lord of Destruction adds two new character classes, one new Act (instead of the original's four) brand new class specific items, runes, and jewels. There are several tweaks to existing characters, and the overall experience is more balanced this time around.

Diablo 2 gives you a fine repetoire of attributes to improve, and properly developing your character in both attributes and skills will prove important to how your character plays.
The attributes follow as such.

While it looks quite simple, you'll be spending a lot of time figuring out which stats to improve in the character screen.[/b]

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Strength - This dictates how much damage you do, and along with that, most pieces of armor and weapons need a good strength level to be used.

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Dexterity - Both improves your attacking rating and your defense rating, a higher dexterity means you will hit more often, and enemies will hit less often. Many weapons need a good dexterity rating.

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Vitality - This is your overall health count, while you do slowly gain health as you level, upgrading your vitality will improve your overall health level heavily.

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Energy - Deciding how much mana you have, which spells and skills use as you cast them, also decides how fast your mana regenerates.

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Your skills vary from spells that cause big booms, give bonuses to your health, improve defense, allows you to hit more than one enemy at once with your weapon, and etc. each character has a unique set of thirty skills, and choosing the right skills and finding ones that benefit eachother are a large part of the game.
Diablo 2 has the prerequisite monster loots, item drops, and armor. Each piece of armor or every weapon has a different look, so your character will almost never look the same as another one.

Diablo 2 and its expansion pack Lord of Destruction, feature seven character classes, every single one is extremely different, attributing to different speed, health, endurance, and unique skill trees.
The classes are as follows.

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Paladin - A "holy warrior" the Paladin has the ability to use auras that benefit him and his party, he excels against undead enemies, and is an even mix of defensive and offensive power.

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Sorceress - The Sorceress focuses on spells, and in return for her massive firepower, she is quite weak in close combat. Although she makes up for this with very powerful elemental spells that range from exploding fireballs to arching lightning. She focuses on spells, so her mana is higher than most.

Spells like Meteor (shown here) are only a few of the powerful spells available to the Sorceress.[/b]

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Barbarian - The Barbarian is completely combat focused, so as one would expect, he doesn't have many spells or much mana. His skills focus on passive abilities that boost his abilities in combat, or just make him far tougher. He also has various combat skills that allow him to mow down enemies easily.

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Amazon - One of the most versatile characters in the game, she is combat focused, but unlike the Barbarian, she relies on speed and dexterity. She can use a bow, javeling, or spear very well, and her skills allow her to use all of those weapons to their full extent.

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Necromancer - For those that like to have others do the work for them, the Necromancer can summon undead allies and golems that will destroy his enemies. He also has curses which weakens enemies and boosts his powers. He also has quite some offensive powers with various powerful magical attacks. He's very frail in close combat, and relies on his minions and long ranged magic attacks to defeat his enemies.

Here my Necromancer displays how devastating an army of skeletal minions can be.[/b]

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Assassin - The Assassin is a mix of magic, and dexterious combat. Her skills rely on taking down enemies quickly with very powerful attacks, and her traps and martial arts moves all defeat enemies in large waves. While she is quite powerful in the damage department, she is frail, and makes up with this with high damage and speed.

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Druid - The more combat worthy version of the Necromancer. His animal companions are lesser in numbers, but stronger and some give boosts to one's party. His elemental skills are powerful, but take up large amounts of mana. The Druid uses his shapeshifting skills to defeat enemies in close combat, making him a fine balance of all skills.

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With all this variety and potential to create whichever type of character you want. Diablo 2 does exceptionally well in the gameplay department.

But despite that, Diablo 2's graphics are quite dated. Even for its time, Diablo was quite drab and bland compared to its counterparts, but it makes up for this with pure gorgeous spell effects. LoD introduces a better resolution, so all the nice lighting effects can be used to their full effect. The visuals in Diablo 2 won't amaze, but they're adequate, and the spell effects are quite nice.

Following that, the sound is great. Each item has an audibly drop, and after awhile, you can tell which item dropped just from the sound it makes. The tinging of a jewel, the thunk of a club, or the metalic clang of armor. The surroundings are atmospheric, and the soundtrack is phenomenal.
Creatures create audable noise, monsters growl behind corners, and spell effects make huge explosions and electrical noise.
The voice acting is exceptional, and each character has a memorable quality because of the pure excellence of the voice acting.

Sound will not dissapoint in Diablo 2.

Diablo II has a massive arsenal of weaponry, armor, helms, amulets, rings, boots, gloves and etc. To create a even larger variety of items, each item comes in a different style, including, normal, socketed, magic, rare, unique and set item. A normal item is exactly that, normal, no added bonuses, interesting effects, or anything else, just a plain item, while magic items usually have a few extra magical abilities. Rare items take the idea of magic items, and expand them, while you'll never find the same rare item twice, certain rare items can be quite powerful, usually containing a large amount of magical bonuses. Unique items though, are incredibly difficult to find, and are usually worth the while, uniques can be incredibly powerful, or provide great defense for your character. Last but CERTAINLY not least, Set items are items that belong to a certain "group" for example, the set "Artic Gear" has a suit of armor, a belt, a bow, and a pair of boots, when worn by themselves, they can hardly be considered more powerful than the lowest of uniques, but when set items are worn with other items of the same set, they give major bonuses, once a complete set has been collected and equipped, you receive massive bonuses. This causes reason for celebration when you find that little set item you've been looking for all along.

On display here is Skullder's Ire, a rather powerful Unique item.[/b]

If you get bored of the Singeplayer, Diablo 2 presents you with an excellent multiplayer mode. Like most games, there's a lobby, and you join whichever game you wish. Quests and the such are handled appropriatly. You can team up with other members, and quests and experience are properly handled between your party members.

Joining a party is one of the many highlights playing online, as shown here.[/b]

As you would expect, characters compliment eachother quite well, and having a good party combination is important to success against your enemies. There's nothing more fun than trading, dueling, or defeating monsters with others, and Diablo 2's multiplayer will keep your busy for a long time.

So if you're looking for something that will keep you busy for a long, long time. Diablo 2 is the game to pick up. If you don't already own this addictive masterpiece, you have something great missing from your collection. If you play it for the Singeplayer, the Multiplayer, or both, Diablo 2 and its expansion are an absolute must.